


Dog Days

by devilinthedetails



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Carthak, Cultural Differences, Dog Days - Freeform, F/M, Family, Father & Son - Freeform, Fatherhood, Gen, parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 02:19:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15402798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: Kalasin, Kaddar, and Binur in the dog days that last all year in Carthak.





	Dog Days

Dog Days

It was late July, and the hot air hovered heavy as dog’s breath even in the coolest hours before dawn broke like a cracked egg over the Zekoi. Kalasin had spent the night tossing fitfully from side to side, her belly that bulged with her second child making every possible position uncomfortable in its own fashion, trying to find a place on her pillows not warmed from her head and kicking off the silk sheets on her side of the bed she shared with Kaddar. Kaddar, too used to her restless sleep, didn’t grunt or grumble at her motions but snored softly into the crook of his elbow. 

Uneasy dreams of storms that would cut through the heat and flood the Zekoi’s delta with fertile silt–a cause for both festivity and fear in Carthak, where the river was life blood and destroyer–flitted through her mind in the intervals where she managed to sleep with her skin sweaty and sweltering. Just before the dawn, she must have been in the midst of such a slumber because when Binur, who must have tip-toed quiet as the cats bred and revered in Carthak into their bedchamber from his adjoining one, leapt onto her husband, she was jolted out of her dream of downpours and flooding. 

“Binur!” Kaddar awoke with a start, grasping his chest with one hand and massaging the leg Binur had jumped on with the other. “Are you trying to stop my heart or just break my leg?” 

“I only wanted to wake you up, Father!” piped Binur, his crooked grin emphasized by his first missing milk tooth. “It’s almost dawn.” 

“So it is.” Kaddar shifted Binur off his lap and drifted toward his pillows again. “That makes it a perfect time for me to go back to sleep. Return to your own bed or stay here, but let me sleep, son, or I’ll be snappish as a crocodile all day.” 

“Father.” Binur pouted and held out an elaborately carved and painted wooden boat he had received from his Uncle Roald and Aunt Shinko yesterday when a merchant ship had arrived from Port Legann bringing it in honor of his birthday. “You promised that you’d take me into the garden first thing this morning to sail my new boat in the pond, and dawn is first thing in the morning. Did you forget?” 

“Of course I didn’t forget. It just takes me longer to remember things at dawn because my mind isn’t awake yet.” Kaddar chuckled dryly as he lifted Binur off the bed and onto the marble floor. “Go back to your room and put on some proper clothes. I’ll be in to fetch you for our little adventure once I’ve changed.” 

“Yes, Father.” Smiling from ear to ear, Binur scampered out of their bedroom and into his own through the connecting doorway with its concealing curtain. 

As her son darted off to dress for the day, Kalasin slid her chin onto Kaddar’s shoulder and murmured in a teasing tone, “I thought Carthaki fathers were supposed to be strict with their sons.” 

“I’m strict with Binur when I have to be.” Kaddar was serious in the face of Kalasin’s playfulness. “I barely knew my father before he died in battle, however, and I want my son to know and remember me for more than strictness.” 

“He will.” Kalasin kissed Kaddar’s shoulder in assurance and apology. “You know I never mean anything by my teasing.”

“I know.” Kaddar was silent for a moment before asking, “Will you be accompanying Binur and me to the pond, dearest?”

“No, thank you, the weather is too hot for me to even think about moving nonetheless stepping outside.” Kalasin shook her head. “Back in Tortall, we called scorching days like this dog days.” 

“Dog days?” Kaddar’s forehead furrowed at the unfamiliar term. “Did you refer to them as that because you sweated like dogs on such days?” 

“No, darling.” Kalasin trailed fingers up her husband’s arm and along his sweat-soaked neck. “We named the dog days of July and August in honor of a dog-shaped constellation that appears in the sky at dawn or earlier.”

“We don’t have such a constellation in Carthak.” Kaddar peeked out the window as if to be sure even as he established as much. Kissing her hair, her cheeks, and finally her lips, he added, “That’s just as well because dog days last all year here. You’re only having more trouble handling them since you’re pregnant again, my love.” 

“Gross.” Binur had reappeared in the doorway between his room and theirs, announcing himself with gagging noises. “Father, are you going to change or kiss Mother all day long?” 

“Ungrateful, spoiled prince,” muttered Kaddar, his words funneled into the shell of Kalasin’s ear so only she could hear. “Doesn’t he realize that if I didn’t kiss you he wouldn’t be alive to sail his beloved boat?” 

“He’s too young to realize that.” Kalasin nudged Kaddar in the ribs even as her lips quirked in wry amusement at his quip. “Anyway, it’s you who spoil him by failing to be a strict Carthaki father.” 

“I do, but it’s you who aid and abet me in my crime, so you deserve the same sentence,” Kaddar retorted as he climbed out of bed to dress for the day. “Time for me to go into the garden and sweat like a dog.”


End file.
